


Hard to Breathe

by DilophoLehnsherr



Category: Back to the Future (Movies)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Child Abuse, Child Neglect, Drinking, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Father Figures, Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Marijuana, Stabbing, Underage Drinking, Violence, i didnt even know what the title was until now, just took a vague idea and was like "thatll do", what are you a cop?, you think i know how this story's gonna go?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-19
Updated: 2020-07-25
Packaged: 2021-03-03 04:27:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 16,656
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24268921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DilophoLehnsherr/pseuds/DilophoLehnsherr
Summary: The concept of home is complicated for one Marty McFly. "Home" is where Mom drinks herself into a stupor, and Dad is too chicken shit to prioritize his son over the folks who walk all over him. "Home" is a house full of yelling and negligence, of emotional manipulation and, dare he say it, abuse. Is that the right word? Does abuse have to be physical for it to be valid? Is being afraid of his own parents a red flag, or simple teenage angst?But there is one place that "home" doesn't have to be put in quotes.And Doctor Emmett Brown is going to make damn sure this brilliant, mischievous, compassionate young boy can finally be brought home after 17 years.Let's just hope George and Lorraine don't have a good custody lawyer.
Relationships: Emmett "Doc" Brown & Marty McFly
Comments: 78
Kudos: 173





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hey guys, hold my beer and watch how hard I can project onto a fictional character!

It was a well-known fact that teenagers were predisposed to erratic circadian rhythms. Equally well-known was the fact that teenagers needed as much uninterrupted rest as an infant in order to grow and mature to their full potential. Thus, the extra bed in Doctor Emmett Brown’s house was nothing short of a natural and logical addition, especially when his young charge spent so much of his time in his presence. It was important to him that Marty felt safe, secure, comfortable; nothing short of completely at home. 

One Marty McFly was currently passed out from his latest experiment, in which he attached rocket thrusters to the wheels of his skateboard in a sudden burst of adolescent impulsiveness. All the excitement had simply taken its toll on the poor recently-bruised kid, and Doc figured it was best to let him sleep, best to let the boy have his peace and quiet. Besides, he needed some of that too. It was a good opportunity to finalize some documents, flip through all that legal jargon, figure out what the best course of action was before he contacted his lawyer. 

Doc settled down in his armchair, a haphazard stack of papers in his hands. No one ever said that a mad scientist had to be organized. He had a system. He turned his head, peered over his shoulder to do a quick check on Marty. Fast asleep, mumbling away to himself, drooling all over his own face. Einstein had curled right up next to him, looking content to be used as a makeshift pillow for that rowdy kid he couldn’t seem to get enough of. The sight brought such a warm feeling, Doc couldn’t help but smile at it. Marty was so happy here, so at-ease, so content, Doc wished he could make it last forever for that boy.

Doc just wanted the brightest little shit in Hill Valley to have a good home. He deserved that much, didn’t he?

The smile faded from Doc’s face, melting into a melancholy sigh: an extraordinarily rare sight on the man performing it in genuine. He turned back to his documents, slipped his reading glasses on, and let that burning resolve get him through these brutal write-ups. If Marty slept through to the night, he’d let him stay; he wasn’t about to wake him up. Dealing with his parents was going to be a hassle, but he’d put up with a lifetime of hassle to give Marty something stable and dependable. Was that too much to ask for? Apparently, if one asked the boy’s parents.

***

Doc’s suspicions had begun innocently enough. Shortly after a 13 year-old Marty had taken up a job as his joint lab assistant and dog sitter, a certain incident had sparked his intrigue into the intricacies of his home life. 

It had been a long day out. Doc couldn’t really remember what he was doing, but he supposed that wasn’t important. He was counting up the hours he had been gone, tallying up the cash he owed that little rascal for taking care of Einstein as he absentmindedly stepped through his front door. Very few things caught Doc off-guard when he was lost in the thoughts of a certain task, but the moment he stepped through the door, something seemed off. He looked left, he looked right, he squinted and frowned, but couldn’t quite put his finger on what was so peculiar that it halted him in his tracks.

_Whimper._

If Doc had a dog’s ears, they would have shot up. Without a word, stuck in his resolve as he often got, he speed-walked towards that concerning noise without bothering to kick his shoes off.

And there, he saw it.

Well, more accurately startled it.

If by “it,” you mean _him_.

Marty sucked in a shocked breath, reacting on instinct as he stood up quickly, seeming to forget that he had holed himself up with Einstein under the desk and giving his head a rather hard bang, sending himself falling back down with a shriek of pain.

“Woah, there!” Doc squatted down to Marty’s eye level, looking between the young boy and Einstein. The dog looked hesitant to leave Marty’s side, pawing at his feet and whimpering. Ah, so that’s what he heard. Marty, on the other hand, was now grasping at the newly-formed bump on head with trembling hands, but not trembling in the way of lingering surprise. No, he was tense. Full-body tense. It was a muscle spasm caused from the tightness in his hands. “Hey, hey, Marty,” Doc asked gently, although his worry couldn’t be disguised. “Are you alright? You hurt? You didn’t concuss yourself there, did you?”

Marty sniffled, quickly clawing at his face in a vain attempt to erase the evidence, but the damage had already been done. Still, very few things in this world could stop a 13 year-old boy from asserting himself against an adult, and this one was no exception. Marty scrambled out from under the desk, rubbing at the back of his head, but trying to act casual about it as he stood on wobbly legs. “I’m fine,” he insisted, withdrawing into himself with a guarded look in his eye. “Einstein jammed one of his toys down there, and I was just getting it out for him. That’s why he was so weepy. You just startled me, that’s all.”

The kid was lying, it was written all over his face. He hadn’t known Marty for very long yet, but Doc knew enough that quick explanations and a total lack of expression was very un-Marty. It was strange, for there was no reason to lie about something being clearly wrong, but then again, teenagers were often unpredictable in their behaviour patterns. Hormones made them act in all kinds of weird and exaggerated ways. Maybe he had gotten picked on at school a bit too much, or didn’t get the part he wanted in the play. Was Marty even _in_ drama? Either way, Doc decided it was best to drop the matter. “Well, if your head’s okay, I suppose it’s alright. Not feeling dizzy or nauseous, or anything?”

“All good,” Marty answered a bit too quickly, nodded a bit too stiffly. 

Doc figured it was just embarrassment at being caught. No need to push him. “Right. Well, I have the cash I owe you, thanks for not burning the place down. Should I call your parents and let them know you’re coming h-”

Doc never got a chance to finish that sentence, because it drove quite the reaction out of his newly-hired dogsitter. Blue eyes shot wide open, his jaw clenched hard enough to grind down his canines, and a resounding “ _No!_ ” followed, the conclusiveness of which drove Doc to flinch himself. He seemed to realize his mistake the next moment, for he softened up, gave a fake little chuckle, as if to laugh at himself and break the tension. “Sorry, I meant, uh… I meant that it’s just… my mom naps around this time, and I don’t wanna wake her up, you get me?”

***

Suspicions arose slowly over time, but that painful memory was the catalyst that sent the ball rolling. If only he knew the extent of what Marty had to deal with then, he might have been able to shake some sense into the kid from the get-go, or… no. No, no, this was probably the best possible outcome of a terrible situation. Marty trusted him now, more than he trusted those parents of his, and that was good. Very good. 

_Whimper._

Doc looked over to the source of the sound with a twitch to his movements. It wasn’t a dog this time. No, it was a voice he’d recognize anywhere, even when it was still cracking on all sorts of pitches and tones. One Marty McFly was still fast asleep, but he had curled up a little closer to Einstein, burrowed his face a little more into his fur. 

Well, he wasn’t getting much done anyway.

Doc stood from his chair, and crossed the room. Poor kid, he was prone to active nightmares. Likely a side effect from his familial trauma, as difficult as that notion was to swallow for a man with strong paternal instincts towards him, stronger than he’d care to admit. With cautious movements, Doc sat down on the edge of the bed, careful not to wake him, for that could cause an undue fear response. “G-go away…” Came that little sob from Marty, in that scared tone that never failed to break Doc’s heart. He curled up tighter around Einstein, who had learned by now that Marty simply needed a calm presence to hang onto, mind the pun. “Please, I just-” Marty hiccupped, voice heavy with those emotions he was always so stubborn about holding back. “I don’t wanna be here.”

That comment had Doc taking a gentle hand to the young boy’s hair, shushing him soothingly as he combed down his scalp. “You’re not, you’re not. You’re with me, Marty.”

That familiar voice stirred something deep in Marty’s subconscious, for the initial surprise swiftly faded in favour of the tenseness leaking out of his body, grip loosening and relief flooding over his figure. “Oh… Doc,” Marty’s smile leaked into his faraway voice, and it was rather contagious. That, or bittersweet relief at the boy who was so much more to him than a lab assistant settling down into peaceful respite once again, all from the sound of his voice alone. “I like it better with you…” Marty drawled, and that had Doc blinking in surprise, for such well-formed thoughts were rare for even the most sophisticated sleep-talker. “Can I stay here instead?”

A slow, heavy sigh. A hand slid down to brush that unruly hair out of a sleeping boy’s face. “I’m working on it, kid. It’s my most important project yet.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Marty rides back home, and nothing makes sense.  
> Mom's been drinking again, and nothing makes sense.  
> It's all just a little bit too overwhelming, and it doesn't make sense why.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm back, with a longer chapter!! I'm like, super invested in this story and I have so much fun writing it, so please please please enjoy, and I'd LOVE to hear all your thoughts on it!!

The wind in his hair and the sound of wheels on asphalt was a bit like Marty’s happy place. It was familiar, calming, and no matter what happened, he could always count on his skateboard to be there. He had to hide Jennifer from his parents, had to hide the growing personal interest in science he was getting from Doc, had to hide everything, but this simple means of conveyance could take him away from all that. It put him in control for once, which was a position seriously lacking at home. 

Home. Marty flipped the word around in his head; still had an odd feeling to it. 17 years running in that place, you’d think it wouldn’t be confusing. “Fuck, man,” Marty mumbled to himself under his breath, deciding to veer left at the next turn and take another lap around town square just to have a bit more time to himself. Everything was complicated and confusing when one was 17, so if something so simple seemed confusing, then logically, it was just teenage drab, right? Yeah, yeah… that sounded right.

Marty glanced down at his watch, making an irritated face when he realized that he couldn’t delay heading home any longer, or Mom and Dad would have his hide, and Linda and Dave would probably pile onto the bullshit. He almost wished Doc had woken him up before night fell. He passed out dead tired in the afternoon, and slept clean through to the next morning. Good thing it was a weekend.

Marty adeptly grabbed onto the back of a passing truck, letting it cruise him along down the road towards Lyon Estates. 2 miles to go. Just him, the breeze on his face, and his thoughts. Thoughts, thoughts… Doc often praised him on those, saying he had a brilliant mind, that he was much smarter than he gave himself credit for, and had a wonderfully unique way of seeing and navigating the world. He’d never quite heard such things from anyone before, but then again, Doc had a way of making him feel at home.

Home. There’s that word again, but it’s not uncomfortable or confusing to assign it to Doc. Marty frowned to himself, for that just made him more confused, paradoxically enough. It felt like he was being run in circles, chased by some unknown apparition demanding answers from him that he simply didn’t have. 

There’s the turnoff. A little pull from the truck’s rear bumper and a smooth turn, and he was back in control. 1 mile to go. Halfway there. 

Now that was a strange thing to think about: control. Why was it that giving up control willingly felt different than when it felt as though he had no choice? Marty absentmindedly kicked himself forward, mostly operating on practiced autopilot while his racing brain took up most of his energy. That was a bit like giving up control, too: trusting his own body to take him the rest of the way, but it didn’t feel the same way that Mom and Dad felt. And Mom and Dad weren’t the same as Doc. Doc felt more like this, like willingly giving up control out of trust and always receiving something positive in return, while Mom and Dad felt like… Like…

Marty stomped his rear foot down, leading his skateboard to a screeching halt. He only noticed then that he must have been biting at his bottom lip a bit too hard, for a metallic taste flooded into his mouth when he unclenched his jaw. He wanted to pace, to mutter to himself, maybe sit down somewhere that was not made for sitting and think it all through. 

Those were all habits he picked up from Doc.

Marty gave his head a frustrated shake, as if to make all those disconnected thoughts fall back into place, or silence them entirely. He wasn’t even sure which one he was hoping for, if at all. 

That’s it. No more thinking. It’s bad for one’s mental health. Marty slung his bag off his shoulder, and quickly fished out his walkman, popping open the case to see what he had to work with. Huey Lewis. He could make that work. Headphones slipped on, walkman clipped to his belt, and he set off again, this time catching a passing neighbour’s car that he recognized from his home street. At least the rest of the way back would be easier.

***

“Where in the  _ hell _ have you been all night?”

So, the rest of the way back was easier. Being back was a different story. It was always a different fucking story. One would think Marty would be able to desensitize himself to the yelling, the commitment to misunderstanding him, the  _ everything _ , the  _ routine _ to it all, but you would be wrong. “I was at Doc’s, you know that.” Marty answered simply, not making eye contact, sitting stiffly on the living room couch with crossed arms, chewing at his already injured bottom lip. It was painful, yes, but he didn’t stop chewing at it. It was a distraction, and one he could control. The pain didn’t come from anyone else but him, so no one could take that away from him.

His mother, on the other hand, had been drinking. Always drinking. Marty could recognize different types of alcohol from the smell alone, all because of Mom. It’s why he didn’t like alcohol, even if he’d never had it before. He didn’t have any desire to go anywhere near that toxic waste they peddled as a beverage. But Mom had been drinking, and when she had been drinking, which was damn near always, she was quick to anger. “He’s nearly twice  _ our _ age, Martin! You really can’t expect me to believe that he has  _ your _ best interests at heart.” She all but spat it at him, and Marty rolled his eyes and gave an exasperated sigh. He’d heard it all before, and he guessed he would hear it again. “He’s a nut job, a crackpot, and all  _ you _ are to him is a lab rat. The sooner you accept that and get it through your thick skull that you need to make friends your age, that  _ he _ doesn’t really care about you, the better you will be. How many friends do you have, really? Who’s your best friend? Because I can count on  _ one _ hand how many friends you have, and I’m not even sure any of them are more than acquaintances.”

Marty tensed a bit more, and turned his head further away from Mom’s wrath, aiming his eyes at his feet instead of the battleground. He took a discreet sniff of the air: whisky. Mom was never forgiving when she drank whisky. Best to keep quiet and let her rage run its course.

“Well?!” Mom snarled, and Marty flinched on instinct. “Jesus Christ, I’m not going to  _ hit  _ you! The way you’re acting, you’d think I was pulling a bullwhip on you on the regular. Have I ever hit you?”

Marty shook his head.

“Then stop acting like such a chicken.”

***

Emotions ran high for him after that, as they always did. However, he was in no position to express such things, as Mom always acted like everything was fine and dandy after those little spats. Well, can it really be called a spat if only one party participated? Either way, Marty wasn’t hungry when dinner rolled around. Too many complicated feelings, too much confusion about it all, and the lingering stench of whisky made him nauseous, anyway. So, he claimed he was sleepy, that he already ate a lot today, and ducked into the safety of his room for the rest of the night. At least he had this place, when he could get to it. A compact space, his own phone, and no one really bothered him.

He was finally alone.

Totally alone.

And if you’ve ever been alone when your emotions run high, you know it creates a glorified echo chamber. Marty sat on the edge of his bed, flipping through books, comics, rifling through all his old stuff, begging for some kind, any kind, of a distraction. Jennifer? He reached for his landline, snatching it off the receiver and peeking up over the headboard, his fingers hovering over the numbers, but not pressing down. Jennifer usually made him feel better, but she didn’t know about this; what if they thought he was a coward? He never told anyone about this, no one except…

Marty blinked wide eyes to himself, and looked back to his bedroom door to double-check that it was locked. Then, he sucked in a deep breath and held it, focusing on the sounds of the house, pinpointing everyone by their voices, the way their feet fell when they walked, how far away they were from earshot. It was safe, he supposed. Safe enough. So, he looked back to the receiver, and dialed that series of numbers that had become automatic to him.

He sat back against his headboard as he listened to it ring. One, two, three, four rings, before a blessedly familiar voice answered the call, frantic and scattered as ever: “Hello?! If this is about a retainer fee, I don’t  _ have  _ it! You explicitly said in your contract that I wouldn’t have to pay it until we  _ knew  _ we were going to court, and I don’t see any-”

“Doc?” Marty squeaked incredulously, upon which the man on the other end quite audibly stopped in his tracks.

“Marty...?”

“Last time I checked,” Marty quipped, but the attempt landed flat. As reserved as he tried to be with his negative emotions, with anything that disrupted his cool and collected exterior, Doc could always see right through him somehow. So, he tried to change the subject quickly. “What was all that about? Court? Is someone trying to sue you for property damage again?”

“No, no, nevermind that. We’ll talk about it later; I was going to discuss it with you anyway, but it’s a bit of a heavy subject, and it’s important that you go into it emotionally prepared, which I can hear quite well that you are  _ not _ . What’s wrong, kid? Talk to me.” The sound of a sliding chair from the other end, probably Doc preparing to sit out a long talk in case Marty needed it.

“Don’t you have, uh,” Marty swallowed back the lump in his throat, choked back the crack in his voice. “Inventions to do?”

“They can wait,” Doc answered easily, immediately. No one else could get between Doc and his scientific breakthroughs, but the moment Marty needed something, he just seemed to drop it all to run to his aid. “And besides, you called  _ me _ , Marty. You’re acting strange. Makes a man worry.” Worry? Someone worried about him? A sudden sniffle reflexively left the young boy, for after the events of the day, he simply felt too overwhelmed to be able to stop it. His eyes stung, his split lip trembled, and mortifyingly enough, his best friend was on the other line hearing it all in real time. “Oh, Marty…” came that sympathetic voice, understanding, compassionate, not like his mother, who called him cowardly names, or his father, who was too emotionally scared to connect with his own kids. “Do you want to talk about it?” The way he said it was as if he already knew what was wrong, like he already had a comforting response planned.

Marty shook his head, before realizing that Doc couldn’t see him. “I don’t… I don’t know if I can,” he stammered. “I don’t even know if  _ I _ know what’s wrong. It’s all so confusing, and I can’t make heads or tails of it.”

“Hey, that’s okay. I find that when I’m confused about something, it helps to ask questions, no matter how dumb you think they sound in your head.” 

Hey, that was a good idea. And better yet, Marty had the smartest man in California on the other line. If anyone could help him, it would be Doc. “Okay, uh…” one more sniffle, a rub at his eyes, and finally, he dropped that bombshell question: “Do you think my parents really love me?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're getting into it now, folks... remember that hill-looking bastard from high school english class about the structure of a story and all that??? Rising action boutta hit us like that train hit the DeLorean


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The drab of a typical day in the life of a high school student is truly timeless, isn't it?  
> Drab, boring, whatever you call it, the devil lies in the details.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In hindsight, maybe it was a bad idea to title this fic "Hard to Breathe" in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic.  
> Also, I haven't been in a high school-level math class, or any math class, in about 4 years now. And even then, I barely passed. It's a miracle I got into a good college with those math grades on my transcript, honestly. Pwease go easy on me in that scene 
> 
> Okay, so I know this isn't the most action-packed chapter, but it's crucial to setting up my dominoes so I can knock them down for you guys. I need the foundation to my madness so the madness makes sense! But thank you all so much for your continued support and wonderfully kind words!! It really makes me wanna write more faster when y'all are so sweet ;-;

_ Do you think my parents really love me? _

That question carried so much weight, so many layers to it, that what followed was a moment of silence from both parties. Some things just had to steep for a while, and in a way, there was mutual understanding in that.

But what do you say to a kid who’s clearly upset, who’s looking to you for comfort, understanding, projecting that unmet need for a parental bond onto you, whether he is aware of it or not? Doc sat back in his chair, glancing down at Einstein’s little head, propped up on his knee. That dog looked so sad, almost parroting the emotional toll on the other end, but Einstein always did have a thing for Marty. Maybe it was the dogsitting, or his constant presence in the lab in later years, but he could always tell when Marty was off. 

“You still there, Doc?” Marty asked, a touch of desperation in that quiet voice. He was never quiet, or cautious, so that was a concerning sign. 

“Yeah, I’m still here. I’m not going anywhere.” And he meant what he said. “Just thinking about what you asked.”

“Shouldn’t it be a no-brainer? I mean, they’re my parents, aren’t they? They say they love me, and they take care of me, and it’s not like I wasn’t hugged enough as a kid, you get me? They say they love me.” Oh, boy. Doc could practically see that look Marty got when the gears were turning in his head. Furrowed eyebrows, narrowed eyes, mouth slightly open. If there’s one thing that boy didn’t have, it was a poker face, or in this case, a poker voice.

“I think they do love you,” Doc finally answered, to be met with a heavy silence on the other end. “ _ But _ -” well, there was no sense lying to the kid. He was still young and immature, but he was at that age that certain heavier topics were due to be discussed. And hey, if he was intending on taking the reins in raising him eventually, maybe now was a good time to demonstrate that. “Not all love is healthy. Love isn’t a dominant emotion, and it doesn’t cancel out other emotions or actions. Especially not actions. If their actions are not healthy, then neither is their love, regardless of its existence. Do you understand, Martin?”

Oh, god. It was a rare occasion when Doc was serious, and even rarer when his full first name was used instead of his nickname. It caught his full attention, demanded to be actively listened to, and the words themselves left a lot to think about. Marty swallowed in order to stifle the growing trembling in his throat, but it was just coming through stronger. The moisture in his eyes spilled over, and he blinked as he felt that wet trail form on his cheek. 

“Marty?”

“H-here,” Marty stuttered. His free hand flew up to cover his mouth as his teeth ground into each other, lips tugged back on their own accord, and something dragged itself out of his vocal cords: a high-pitched, quiet little sound of distress. No, no, not now. C’mon, McFly, this was nothing to cry about! It was just a bit of a complicated, confusing… not really confusing, but confusing? Fuck, what was he supposed to do? Acting on instinct, Marty shifted, bringing his legs up to his chest and hugging his shins, ducking his head into his knees to create some illusion of compacted space. He liked small spaces. Something about them helped clear his head. That’s why he always slept better at Doc’s; the bed he set up for him was tucked into a corner, and a bookshelf pushed up against the other side, a wonderful set-up for him. Always a wall to face, boxed in safely, almost as if Doc knew he felt safer in small spaces.

There came the man himself again, tone soft, careful, but not pitiful. It offered a crutch to temporarily rest upon without questioning Marty’s emotional strength. “Do you want me to stay on the line?”

“Uh-huh,” Marty croaked, nodding his head along despite the lack of any visuals. He didn’t want to be alone, not now, not when everything felt so overwhelming. “Thanks, Doc. Doesn’t really sound like it, but-” he paused for a moment, if only to rub the moisture from his face, to take a deep, grounding breath. “It helps. Talking to a wise old man who probably witnessed the birth of the universe.”

“The Big Bang was much more captivating than helping you make a stronger acne cream because none of that store-bought junk worked, Mr. McDry-skin” Doc retaliated near-flawlessly with an amused chuckle to his voice, catching Marty off-guard with a brief stammer.

“You can’t take advantage of my emotional state to win! That’s cheating!” 

Another laugh from the other end. Man, Doc could always make him feel better, even after such a heavy conversation. “I didn’t realize we were playing. You were trying?” 

***

Marty stifled a bored yawn as he blinked bleary eyes at the equations in his notebook. He never liked math, it was never his best subject, being a more creatively-minded person, but it was a good pull back into reality after the night he had. Jesus, he really had gotten weepy for a second there. He was almost embarrassed to face Doc again after that, not that he expected any judgment from him. 

Ugh. Numbers. They always got all jumbled up and scrambled in his head, and what was this about letters, now? Imaginary numbers? Infinitely approaching infinity?! Math;  _ math _ was what stopped Marty from considering science as a legitimate career path. Mixing chemicals was fun, the physical world was fascinating, dissecting sheep hearts was gnarly, but the moment those blasted  _ numbers _ factored into it, you lost him in a sea of confusion and disorientation. Better he stick to the guitar and the doodles he was currently scratching in the margins of his notebook instead of paying attention.

“Mr. McFly!” The annoyed, faux-cheery voice of his math teacher snapped his attention back up to the blackboard, which all looked like Greek to him. “Would  _ you _ like to enlighten us, considering you seem so engaged in the lesson?”

“Uh…” Marty stammered, a flash of heat rising in his cheeks as chuckling sounded from his classmates. Well, he embarrassed himself already, might as well own it. With an exaggerated shrug and an over-confident smile, he offered up a “four?”

At least his peers were amused by his antics, so further social alienation was narrowly avoided. His teacher, on the other hand, did not seem impressed with him. “I admire your boldness, but I think it would be best if you went over this in detention today.”

Marty’s cocky grin fell, and the giggling around him effortlessly morphed into a chorus of sarcastic calling.

***

“You saw it! It wasn’t even a detentionable offence!” Marty insisted, making wild, accompanying hand gestures to signal his frustration.

“She’s hard on everyone, she’s not singling you out.” Jennifer shook her head and rolled her eyes with an amused smile, before returning her attention back to her food. Her boyfriend always got so worked up about anything he perceived as an insult to his intelligence, competency, or honour. And don’t even get her started on if someone implicated him to be a coward, because then it was all downhill. But she did find that he took her words to heart, which was good. It meant he was working on reeling himself back a little bit better. 

Marty calmed down a bit upon hearing that, because she was right. She was always right. God, what would he do without Jennifer? Probably something stupid, like he always did. “Yeah… I guess I’m just upset about it. I was gonna go to Doc’s tonight, because he needs help with this weird new rigged DeLorean thing he’s fixated on but won’t tell me anything about. Now I have to go and disappoint him because I had to act like a smart-ass in math.” Honestly, why did he open his mouth at all?

Jennifer put down her sandwich, and tilted her head at him with a thoughtful look. “Why are you so concerned about the approval of someone you already have the approval of? Why are you acting like your own judge, jury, and executioner about an honest mistake?” This didn’t sound like Marty. No, Marty would be frustrated, but he didn’t beat himself up or place his worth in other people’s approval. That sounded more like, well- “everything okay at home?”

That last question made his blood turn to ice, the colour draining from his complexion. Still, he was a good actor. He could fake a convincing smile, even if it was borderline painful to do so around his girlfriend, but what else was he supposed to do? What was he supposed to tell her? She knew his parents were strict, but not to the extent of negligence and whatever the hell was causing him so much confusion. How was he supposed to explain it when he didn’t even understand it? He didn’t have the emotional energy to do this here, in a loud cafeteria, right before he had gym class. So, he smiled, crinkling his eyes at the edges and everything, and said “yeah, it’s all good. Just had a restless night, I guess. Barely got a wink of sleep.” A shred of truth always made them more convincing.

It seemed to work, because Jennifer looked fairly convinced and satisfied with that explanation. She sat back on the bench, and changed the subject to something a bit lighter. “You going to Tiff’s party on Friday?” 

“Not if her deadbeat dad’s gonna be there,” Marty answered easily. Tannens and McFlys didn’t really get along; it was one of the fundamental rules of the universe. Mostly because the Tannens tended to bully the McFlys, and after what he’d seen with his father and Biff, he wanted nothing to do with that family, even if he’d never really interacted with Tiff before. Neutrality was better than bad blood, but to put it in layman’s terms, shit was still fucked between their family names. Maybe she was alright, maybe she was even nice, but  _ Tannen _ just put a bad taste in his mouth that he couldn’t wash out.

Jennifer, however, seemed to have a different suggestion for him. “The whole reason she’s throwing a party is because her dad’s gonna be out of town, so you won’t have to worry about him. Besides, you’re so tense and uptight lately, I think a little fun would do you some good. Let you loosen up. You don’t have to drink,” she made sure to include that at the end, to drive that reassurance home. “No drinking, just hang out and forget about whatever’s stressing you out so much for a while.”

Marty ruminated on those words, weighing them in his head. On the one hand, Biff Tannen’s house didn’t exactly strike him as an ideal hang out spot. On the other, Biff wouldn’t be there, and Jennifer, like always, like one of those other fundamental rules of the universe, was right. Maybe a party would do him some good. Maybe he could use some fun. After a pause for thought, for one more consideration, Marty sighed. “Alright, fine. I’ll go. I’ll tell my Mom that I joined a late-night study group for a test or something, and my Dad won’t even question it. But I’m not drinking, no matter how much I’m pressured into it.”

“Okay, I wasn’t pressuring you, Marty.”

“I didn’t say you were, just… don’t bring alcohol near me, alright?”

“No alcohol, I promise.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Parties were never Marty's thing. At least not parties where he didn't know anybody there.   
> General word of advice: don't eat or drink anything that someone you don't trust had a hand in preparing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woo, this one's long. I didn't abandon this, I promise! It's just twice as long as my usual chapter lengths and I also had to apply for CESB and file my taxes, so it's been a WeekTM and this wasn't exactly at the top of my priority list. Let's not commit accidental tax evasion.
> 
> So, there's a lot going on right now, and I understand that this is the place a lot of people come to escape. Because of that, I rewrote a major part of this chapter in my planning. The ending and cliffhanger was originally going to involve Marty being arrested for public intoxication, but I thought the imagery of a wrongful police arrest for a nonviolent drug crime was in poor taste in contrast to current events, to say the least. Because of the turn I took it in, I'm gonna have to take some time to overhaul a lot of my planning, and work around this new problem I've created. I didn't go into it blind, I have a vague idea... an idea skeleton, if you will, of where this is going. Just gotta fill in the meat, so if next update is a bit later, that's why. That, or I might have to take a mental break because of everything going on right now. I will not abandon this fic, I might just need some more time for a number of reasons.
> 
> I wanna thank everyone for leaving your wonderful comments; they really make my day, and I'm so sorry I haven't gotten around to replying to everyone, but please know they are truly what's making me smile right now and I perk up like a dog every time I get an email from AO3 <3
> 
> And I wanna give a special shoutout to @jedflah on tumblr, who drew some truly amazing art of my last chapter that made me clutch my phone and shriek for a while <3 <3 <3 absolutely love it; I saved it, it gives me a dopamine high every time I look at it!!
> 
> This intro has gone on TOO long, so I hope I made the slightly longer wait this time well worth it!!

Marty had never really been the partying type. Not that he was some kind of square, but he just never had any interest in them. This was a new experience, in every sense of the word, but Jennifer said it would be fun, so why not? Maybe it would help him loosen up. Maybe he’d forget about his perpetually spinning head for at least a couple of hours. His story fooled his parents well enough, so they wouldn’t come looking for him; he was safe to stay out and come back late.

The Tannen residence wouldn’t have been his first choice of location, but beggars can’t be choosers. Unfortunately, Marty was already well-acquainted with where it was, thanks to his father needing to suck up to Biff every once in a while in the middle of some errand run he was dragged onto against his will. Making a quick left down the street, the wheels of his skateboard screeching against the road, Marty could already hear the muffled music and cacophonous voices exuding from that little house, and when he pulled up a few moments later, he recognized familiar faces all bright with joy and laughter. That was a good sign, right? At least Jennifer would be there, so he wouldn’t feel totally alone. 

There was nothing like a high school house party to make one realize how irrelevant one was to their academic landscape. Marty wasn’t  _ unpopular _ , per se, nor was he popular. He was just kind of  _ there _ , and no one really talked to him, or knew him. And he made no efforts to be known, nor did he want to be. He didn’t really know if he could be open or vulnerable enough to form those meaningful friendships that Mom had yelled at him about, because the idea of doing that, of opening himself up to that risk, was too intimidating for him. Marty wasn’t one to run away from his problems, and Doc often said that his tendency to choose the ‘fight’ option could get him in trouble one day, but if he never allowed the opportunity for problems to arise, then he’d never have to deal with them.

Marty kicked his skateboard up and caught it, shrugging his bag off enough to stuff it in the main pocket, the front half sticking out the top. The stairs creaked and gave a bit under his weight as he tromped up to the front door, and suddenly, he was confronted with the glaring realization that he had no idea what house party etiquette entailed. Was he supposed to ring the bell? Could he just go right in? Shit, the other kids on the porch were staring at him like he was some kind of moron. Think, McFly, think! 

The door suddenly flew open, nearly knocking Marty across the face and startling him enough to make him jump. A couple of guys who he recognized from the football team stumbled past him from either direction, reeking of low-proof beer. This was one of the very few times in his life that Marty was grateful for his short stature and stick-thin figure, for they didn’t even seem to notice he was there, allowing one McFly to buzz right past and into the house without worrying about making a fool of himself. 

And he discovered quite quickly, that stench of beer wasn’t limited to the star quarterback. Marty gave a nauseated blink and shook a dizzy shudder out of himself. Jesus, it smelled like a rotten wheat field in here, only with a touch of vomit for garnishing purposes. He stuck to one wall to get out of the way of the hallway, and took breathing in shallow doses through slightly parted lips until he could get used to it. That, at least, freed up his attention to scope out the interior. It wasn’t a bad house, surprisingly, if one mentally edited out all the intoxicated adolescents drooling all over each other and acting like dogs in heat. One floor, living room, kitchen, a hallway that led to what Marty guessed were the bedrooms, and the backyard. Typical, suburban, boring. Brows furrowed, but Marty didn’t know what he was expecting. More, he guessed, from Biff Tannen’s home.

Shuffling out from the small foyer towards the living room, Marty got a better look at the place. He caught a glimpse of a keg in the kitchen, surrounded by schoolmates hollering laughter at each other as they filled their plastic cups from it, and in the living room, a fog of smoke hung over a corner where the Hill Valley High stoners were coagulating. Marty breathed normally once again; the skunky smell of marijuana was so dominant that it drowned out the alcohol to his sensitive nose, and he could handle weed, but he couldn’t handle alcohol. It was almost like a blessing to him while others made disgusted faces and moved away from them. 

Now, where was Jennifer? A quick scan of the various faces and voices revealed nothing familiar to him, other than the kids he went to school with. He didn’t see her on the porch, and he couldn’t see anyone of her likeness when he stood on his toes to peer out the window to the backyard. Huh. She wouldn’t be in one of the bedrooms, no, Marty trusted her more than that. Washroom, maybe? Must be. She wouldn’t have just left or not shown up without telling him, but then again, how would she tell him if something came up? She couldn’t call home and leave a message, because then she’d be putting him in the shit with his mother, and she wouldn’t do that to him. Marty just had to trust she was either here and would find him eventually, or that she had a good reason for not being here when she said she would be.

For now, he flopped down onto one end of the couch, dropping his backpack at the side of his feet. No one paid him any mind, because he was just Marty McFly; no one paid him any mind at school, either. So, he sat back, and observed the wild, intoxicated teenager in their natural habitat.

“Hey!” An unfamiliar voice caught Marty’s attention, and when he looked to the source of the sound, he found one of those aforementioned burnouts, leaning heavily against his friend’s shoulder with a carefree smile plastered across his face. “Are you, uh… wha’s that name she told us?”

A brief, dry coughing fit came from his friend, who was equally zonked, as was the technical term, as far an increasingly amused Marty was concerned. “Darcy. Are you Darcy?”

“Marty,” the man himself corrected, enunciating the consonants, as he wasn’t quite sure they were functioning at their full brain capacity. Damn, stoners were fun to watch, and they looked like they were having fun, so why not have a little harmless show? 

Hooded, bloodshot eyes shot open in recognition, and those dopey grins grew even wider. “That’s the one, that’s the one!” the first boy practically sang, “Marty… we had to relay a message to you. Like a couple of great ravens upon your kingly doorstep.”

“What?” His friend giggled, a contagious laugh that had Marty grinning, as well. It was all so absurd: the way they acted, the way they moved, everything about them. He was almost tempted to ask for a bit of what they were having.

“You wanted to tell me something? Me, specifically?” Marty asked, leaning a bit forward on the edge of the couch out of interest in this rather entertaining turn of events.

The first guy answered again this time. Marty thought he would call him Raven, on account of his fantastical outburst. “Yes! Jennifer wanted to tell you that she had to run home. Had some kinda important business to attend to.”

Oh. Well, that deflated Marty’s promising spike in his mood. The amused grin on his face slowly falling to reveal the deep-seated disappointment that instilled in him. He almost felt guilty; he knew he couldn’t blame Jennifer for prioritizing something important over some dumb house party, but at the same time, it felt like he had come here for nothing. Man, what an emotional roller-coaster this week alone was proving to be. He needed sugar. Preferably Pepsi, but he would take anything sweeter than blazes if only the tooth ache would distract him from his steadily declining emotional state.

As if on cue to his telepathic strife, a tray of what looked like brownies was shoved into his field of vision, held in place by an unfortunately familiar bony hand. “Hey, McFly! Wasn’t expecting to see you here.” Ugh, Needles. 

“Um. Hi, Needles.” Marty narrowed his eyes in suspicion, mental hackles up and ready for a confrontation. It was always something with Needles, usually something at his expense. 

But he looked surprisingly chilled out now, no mirth in his eyes or bitterness in his figure as he shook the tray encouragingly towards Marty. “Brownie?”

There was a lot to take in here, and most of it was confusing. First of all, why would someone bring brownies to a party instead of booze or weed? And why go around offering them up to people directly, especially someone you don’t exactly have a positive relationship with? Marty’s glare intensified as he met those eyes that always reminded him of a rabid raccoon on one of those messed-up urban wildlife documentaries. His hand hovered over the tray, but retracted hesitantly. “You aren’t trying to poison me or anything, are you?”

Needles blinked incredulously, as if the very idea was laughably inept. “That’s a hell of a feat to go through just to get at you, Sunshine. You know how hard these were to get? Consider yourself lucky I’m even offering  _ you _ one at all.” 

“What, was flour marked as Soviet propaganda when I wasn’t looking?” Marty rolled his eyes with a chuckle, but his clever retort didn’t seem to go over well with the man holding his potential sugar fix hostage. 

“Don’t be such a smartass, McFly. Or you can get your green from someone else,” Needles growled, and made a move to stand up once more. 

Oh, no. No, no, no. If he had to get through a shitty night like this, surrounded by the stench of low-proof beer and other kids he’d never spoken to, all without a sugar high, Marty might just jump in a lake. “Wait!” His squeaky voice cracked, and Needles settled back down with increased interest. “Fine. Sorry, just… give me a brownie, I’m salivating over here.”   
A rather disgusting smile, and a “was that so hard?” later, and those baked goods that were making Marty’s mouth water were within his reach again. He snatched one from the corner-crispy edges were the best part-and sunk his teeth into it eagerly. Sweet, soft in the middle, delightfully crispy at the edges, and man, did that hit the spot. He didn’t realize how much he needed something wildly unhealthy and stomach-churningly sweet until he got a hold of it. 

No wonder he had swallowed the whole thing in barely a moment. “Hey, can I get another one?” Well, no harm in asking, right?

However, Needles just laughed at him. “I’m cutting you off at one, Sunshine. It’s no fun if my rival dies on me.”

Marty made an incredulous face, and opened his mouth to protest in innocent confusion, but a skunky aftertaste had suddenly given the back of his throat a very unpleasant sensation, and he had to close it again just to swallow it down. “What the hell did you put in these? Tastes like how mowed grass smells.”

Needles pat the top of his head in a decidedly annoying and rather patronizing fashion. “I didn’t put anything in them that weren’t already there. You were the one who went for them.” And with that terribly unhelpful explanation, the bane of Marty’s existence had left.

It was probably fine, right? What could someone do to something as innocent as a brownie?

***

It was not fine. It was decidedly not fine. 

Too much noise. Too many people. Too many people crowded him, and they were all too loud. Was this what sensory overload was? He needed to get out. He needed to get out, and now.

Okay, Marty, think. Get your bearings. Where was he? He slowly moved the arms cradling his head in a protective hold, trembling outside of his control. They felt like molasses. All his movements felt like he was trying to swim through molasses. What was happening to him? Was this what dying felt like? Oh, god… he could feel his heart pounding so hard and fast that he thought it might explode in his chest. Was this it? 

Shh, calm down. Calm down, McFly. Doc said that panic only made things worse, and he could trust Doc; Doc knew what he was talking about. Just get your bearings. 

Okay, where was he? A party. He was at a party. Yeah. That’s why everything was so loud, that’s why there were so many people. With great hesitation, Marty slowly cracked open his eyes, the assault of the light causing a cold shock to run through his overstimulated body. But slowly, surely, his dilated pupils adjusted, and he could move on to lifting his head up from his makeshift hiding place. He felt a bit like a deer playing dead to avoid predation, and lord knew his anxiety levels matched that deep-seated prey instinct that had been locked away and painted over by sophisticated human society. But there was nothing here that could hurt him, no one who had any motive to do so, so why did he feel so damn paranoid?

“I, uh… I gotta go,” Marty drawled to no one in particular. “My Mom’s gonna freak out if I stay out too late.” With that, he snatched the strap of his backpack with a shaky hand, which seemed to be moving at a snail’s pace compared to his mental commands.

“Dude, it’s only ten,” came a chuckle from Raven. “You one of those guys who gets sleepy when it hits?”

Ten? It felt like hours upon hours had passed. Marty could have sworn every gear in his internal clock pointed to midnight, at the very least. He looked down to his watch, but his vision swam in response to the small face and tiny numbers. It strained at his dry eyes and made his head spin, so he looked away again. “Um, sure. I go to bed early. I’m going home.”

“Hey, be careful!”

Marty didn’t glorify him with an answer. He needed out; this was getting too much. The stimulus was starting to make him feel trapped, like the walls were closing in on him. Just go. Just get out, and he could figure it out from there. 

Christ, was he thirsty, though. Like his mouth was full of cotton.

No, out. Don’t stop for water, just get out. He could get water at home. Home? Where was home? Um… Marty gave his head a shake and bonked his temple with the heel of his free hand, just to shut his own brain up. He ignored the dizziness as he stood up, pushed that acidic nausea aside as he pushed through the crowd, and stumbled out the door. No one paid him any mind. He was just Marty McFly, and no one here cared about Marty McFly or his business. 

He almost tripped himself up while hopping down the stairs of the porch, but made it to solid ground eventually and pulled out his skateboard from the main pocket of his bag. Just go. Get out. Go home, wherever his instincts told him home was. Maybe it would shed some light on his recent mental struggle. Slinging his backpack over his shoulders, Marty moved dragging feet over to the curb, dropped his skateboard down, and hopped on.

Home, home, just go home.

Marty breathed out a long, steadying exhale, and pushed forward.

***

Skateboarding was his happy place. The wind in his hair and the sound of wheels on asphalt put him at ease, and right now, he needed something to put him at ease. It was comforting, it calmed him down, even if he wasn’t entirely sure where he was going. He just needed to go, to be away from noises and crowds, and Hill Valley was always rather peaceful and open at night. It could call itself a city all it wanted, but it was more like a sleepy little town.

Marty had never felt as calm as he did now, breezing through the empty town square, the wonderful smell of rain wafting through his nose as it poured from the sky. When did it start raining? Man, who cares? Everything seemed so trivial now that he had gotten away to clear his head. Those sluggish movements came with a profound sense of nonchalance now, and he no longer cared for getting home at a reasonable hour. This was his time, what were his parents gonna do? They never hit him, and in the state he was in, he felt primed and ready for all negativity to slide right off him. Really, why did he care so much? Just live your life, put your arms out and feel the rain drip down your smiling face like a refreshingly cold shower after a heat wave, and whistle the songs that chill you out. 

“I’ve been phoning/night and morning…” Marty graduated to using that practised singing voice of his, which projected from his throat in a perfect lulling tenor. “I’ve heard you say, ‘tell him I’m not home~.’” Oh, that slight reverberation as his voice bounced off the falling rain and surrounding buildings was  _ choice _ . 

Marty turned into the courtyard in front of the clock tower, for he had a sudden urge to get his shoes wet in the grass.

“Now you’re confessin’/but I’m still guessin’/I’ve been your fool for so so-” A shocked yelp cut him off with a shriek as the slickness of the grass caught his momentum, and had his feet gliding forward too quickly to counterbalance. With a rather undignified  _ thud _ , Marty fell flat on his back, knocking the wind from his lungs. Oh. Marty blinked, taking a moment to process what had just happened, but when the mental image of what he must have looked like popped into his head, he forgot all about the dull ache between his shoulder blades in favour of the euphoric giggling that rose up in his throat. Wow, laughing felt really good right now! And so, giggling turned to laughter, and laughter rapidly turned to throwing his head back against the grass and howling out a series of unglorified cackling like some kind of adolescent banshee.

He didn’t know how long he’d been laughing for, as his perception had an interesting relationship with time at the moment. But what cut him off-rather unfairly, in his opinion-was a strong grasp to the collar of his shirt and a rough yank that shot him up to unsteady feet and wobbly legs. Marty nearly fell right back down again with the dizzy spell that ignited in him, but multiple hands now held him in place.

“Momma never give you the talk about being out alone at night, kid?” Huh. The voice was unfamiliar. Deep, threatening, kind of like those old school gangster movies. The face that accompanied it only played into the metaphor: pale, hardened, casually menacing.

“I loved you in  _ The Roaring Twenties, _ Mr. Cagney,” Marty slurred, before he was even realizing he had said it. There wasn’t much of a filter between his thoughts and his mouth to speak of anymore. And hey, that was a pretty good joke! The giggling returned to the back of his throat, and the stranger’s two lackeys, both of which reminded Marty of characters straight out of  _ The Godfather _ , were coughing to hold back their bewildered amusement. 

James Cagney squinted at him, disbelief flooding his expression. “You get dropped on the head as a baby? I’m gonna make this simple, alright? You’re gonna be  _ very generous _ and donate your wallet to our charitable cause, or we’re gonna fit you for a Chicago overcoat.”

Marty lit up at that idea, eyes going wide and smile growing ear to ear. “Oh shit, you’re gonna give me some fancy suit? You guys like, travelling tailors or something?”

“What in the fuck are you-” James Cagney began, but his annoyed voice died when he got a better look at Marty’s eyes. “Are you fucking high?!” Oh, well, the annoyance came back twice as hard, but nothing on god’s green earth could faze Marty right now.

“Not really. My feet are on the ground, see?” He tapped his feet around the grass to prove his point.

“Ugh. Kids these days.” With that rather unsavoury comment, Cagney gestured to his goons, one of which made quick work of snatching his backpack off the ground and rifling through it, while the other took to searching Marty’s pockets, who seemed simply delighted to be going through this experience. That was, until his wallet was fished out of his back pocket.

“Hey, hey!” Marty whined, trying to jump to retrieve it, but his short stature made anything higher than six feet difficult to reach. “That’s mine! You can’t just take my shit, my parents will string me up a flagpole!”

“Not my problem, punk.”

“Eh, boss? He’s only got twenty bucks on him.”

Even in this addled state, Marty was nothing if not a quick-thinker. There was a window of distraction in there, which he saw as a window of opportunity. He couldn’t tell his parents someone had stolen his wallet, they’d punish him. There would be invalidation, there would be psychological warfare, there would be victim blaming. They’d say it was his fault, because everything was his fault. They’d cut him off from Jennifer, they’d cut him off from Doc, they’d overhaul his whole life and take away any freedom he once had, all because he couldn’t be trusted with it. No, no, no. He couldn’t let them steal his wallet, he couldn’t! So, when the opportunity arose, he kicked James Cagney in the shin as hard as he could, and took advantage of the surprise to leap for his wallet.

Marty was not athletic, and he certainly wasn’t tall. What his horrid mathematical skills had calculated were way off, and he barely grazed it before being snatched by the wrist and yanked away with twice the force of before. This time, Cagney didn’t seem so lenient. This time, he was dragged across the grass and shoved up against the rough bark of a tree. Icy hot terror now overwhelmed him, sobering him up faster than any disgusting home remedy could hope to. His heart was racing, but it wasn’t the marijuana. He was shaking uncontrollably, but it wasn’t the weed. Catching sight of a sleek, compact blade aimed decisively at your gut will do that to the best of us.

“I’ll… I’ll stay quiet, I won’t tell anyone! Take whatever you want, I’m sorry! You can’t do this to me! Please, please… I’m only seventeen. I have my whole life ahead of me, please…” Marty’s terror had reduced him to a tearful mess. “I-I’m just a kid! This can’t be it! I haven’t done nothing to no one, I just wanna go home. I know people who will come after you for this! People who won’t take this!”

That knife’s tip inched closer, close enough to prick at his ribs, causing Marty to jump and sob. “Can’t be sure of that. Gotta cover our bases, you understand. You know our faces, kids don’t exactly have the best track records with keeping their filthy little mouths shut, and you got mud on my pants. It’s not personal. It’s strictly business.”

Marty’s blood ran cold. For a brief second, the horrifying realization that he wouldn’t be getting out of this, that no one would come to his rescue, exploded into his consciousness. In the movies, there’s a trope where someone’s life flashes before their eyes right before they’re about to die. That didn’t happen, but instead, there was a fleeting moment of total serene acceptance. Marty could smell every raindrop that splashed onto the grass, hear every slosh they made, and instead of his life flashing before his eyes, it was the film that discount James Cagney referenced. If the last thing he was going to hear in this world was a  _ Godfather _ reference, he wouldn’t go down without a fight. 

So, with the breath he was sure would be his last, Marty spat out a surprisingly calm “Oh,  _ fuck you. _ ”

But if there was one thing Marty McFly was right about, just one thing ironed out with absolute certainty, it was that people did care about him. And they would not stand for this. In fact, they would not stand for him failing to check in after promising he would in the middle of a highly-emotional time. And those people, one of which was, in fact, a dog, knew where old habits often took him in moments of distress.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hospitals. How does one begin to describe those awful places? They're even worse when you're the one in the bed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am,, so sorry for how long this took. I'm not doing the best just, like, mentally, so I've been running on fumes for a while. I promised it wasn't abandoned, though! And I'm gonna see it through to the end, even if some chapters take me longer than others to do so. I hope that last chapter wasn't too bad of a cliffhanger to leave everyone on

Whatever they say about dying in the movies, they’re wrong. It isn’t some quick release towards a welcoming light at the end of the long, dark tunnel that represents life. Well, not for Marty, at least. Not when the act of the murder in question didn’t lend itself to a quick demise. No, he was forced to sit it out-or, more accurately, lay it out. At least, he knew it took a long time, but the details were fuzzy. There was pain, there was the encroaching cold that got worse with every second, and there was the fog growing thicker and thicker in his consciousness until it collapsed on itself in a haze of heavy black.

There were other memories, too. Little fuzzy tidbits of harsh fluorescent light that hurt his eyes, of voices too muffled to assign a name to but batted in the ballpark of recognition, and of more crushing black. It was no surprise that when he did wake up at first, it wasn’t to full awareness. And on Doc’s end, this was completely understandable, especially when the kid in front of him was zonked out on enough painkillers to tranq an elephant. But at those first signs of wakefulness from his young charge, groaning and whimpering with terrible lag, that late-night worried sleepiness dissolved in favour of totally alert hope.

“Marty?” Doc asked after him, frantic, distraught. Nothing quite compared to the night they’d just had. Nothing in his long life could quite live up to the scare this kid had just given him. And now, here he was: being pumped full of someone else’s blood, stitched up like a tattered child’s toy, and being fed enough drugs to give Nancy Reagan a heart attack. “Hey, Marty…” Doc leaned forward in his chair, but avoided crowding him. Marty seemed to respond to his own name, giving vague little signals like a pointed groan or a small tilt of his head towards the sound. He wasn’t quite conscious yet, but he was getting there. That was good. That was good. Maybe some more passive stimuli would help him along. Maybe just talking to him about any mundane thing would get that ball rolling. “You feeling okay?” Good one, Emmett. Talk about the dumb question of the year award. Of course he didn’t feel okay; he’d be concerned if Marty felt fine right now.

The man in question very much agreed with that sentiment, even if he couldn’t read minds. Marty recognized Doc’s voice, because he always would. Doc had a certain association in his subconscious: safe, caring, empathetic. All that intelligent genius stuff came later; that man was always there for him, no questions asked, and Marty could depend on him. So, even when he was too out of it to put a name to that familiar sound, he could process his words and find ease in that presence. “Tha’s a… dumb question,” Marty drawled in that barely-there voice. Strength and sensation began to return to his body as his awareness returned, and that wasn’t all for the better. He didn’t know where he was, he had no memory of what had happened, other than something he couldn’t tell his parents. That was abundantly clear, like a sticky note he had hammered into his frontal lobe: don’t tell Mom and Dad. Don’t tell Dave or Linda, because they would tell Mom and Dad. What he couldn’t tell them, even he didn’t know at this odd crossroads of his subjective reality, but if there was one thing his addled brain pulled from the blurry mess that was his memory, it was that he couldn’t tell his parents. What he couldn’t tell them was as good a guess as any, but he just couldn’t tell them.

Ashy blue eyes cracked open with a squint of effort, only for another groan to escape him when the light assaulted his eyes. God, were fluorescent lights always this bright? Marty’s first instinct was to move his left arm up to shield his face, but he found his movements to be clunky at best, and it felt like there were things attached to it: the resistance he would usually associate with his headphone wire sourced from the crook of his elbow, and the slight pinch of an unidentified plastic object on his index finger. “What in the…?”

“Hey, hey, don’t mess with that, kid.” There was that voice again, a little urgent this time, but still gentle, non-judgmental. A second set of hands coaxed his left arm back down, and nudged away his right one. Was Marty reaching for those things stuck in his arm? He must have been, or his hand wouldn’t have been there. Oh lord, he felt like hell. If this was what a hangover was, he wanted even less to do with alcohol. “I’m not a  _ medical _ doctor, but I don’t believe ripping out an IV is the best idea.”   
“IV?” Marty’s tongue felt numb and heavy in his mouth, and the words that left it barely felt like his own. He would liken it to being a casual observer of his own experiences, or like he was controlling himself through an arcade game. Unfortunately, all the  _ Wild Gunman _ skills in the world wouldn’t lead to much sense now. Might as well just let his eyes close again like they wanted to.   
That voice wasn’t done yet, but as his sluggish head booted up like an old switchboard, it was starting to make more sense. Something approaching specific recognition graced Marty’s perception the more it talked to him in that soothing tone. “You just relax. You’ve been asleep for almost four hours now.”

Oh! Marty knew who that was! Of course, how could he forget? It was the man who was always there for him, who never talked down to him, who offered the one place in this world where Marty felt some semblance of  _ home _ . A brilliant inventor, a certified genius, and the nicest man in this dilapidated excuse for a town. how could he forget who that voice belonged to? “Dad? ‘S that you?” 

Silence from the other end. Not necessarily uncomfortable, but more accurately, surprised. Eventually, he did get his response: a stammered “you want your father? He’s not here yet, but he’s on his way, pal.”

Man, what was Marty supposed to do with that? What a non-answer. He wasn’t asking about anyone else, he was asking after  _ him _ ! Maybe if he could get a bit closer, it wouldn’t be so difficult to get it through to him. “No, no, I…” Ugh, what was he on? Why was moving so difficult? Marty attempted to inch himself towards that sound, to roll onto his side, but the pressure to his right side made a shock of pain run up his spine. “Ah,  _ fuck _ !” he squeaked, choking out a whimper on his next exhale. 

Almost on cue, that presence whipped itself closer to him. There was the screech of chair legs against linoleum, the sound of shuffling, and in barely a second, Marty could sense a hesitant hand hovering over his head. C’mon, just a little bit lower… there was so much prolonged, aching pain spread across his abdomen, concentrated in a few icy spots, he would give anything in the world to just have a touch of comfort. With a coaxing whine, Marty lifted his head up from the scratchy pillowcase and nudged his temple at that hand, before letting his head fall back down. He didn’t much feel up to talking at the moment, but he was fairly natural at non-verbal communication, and besides, he seemed to get the hint.

With a second’s pause, probably for consideration, there came a soothing motion that ran through his mop of thick brown hair. It worked at a smooth, steady rhythm, tucking a stray lock behind his left ear and making Marty acutely aware of the cold sweat that dampened his hair. It put him at ease, made him feel more secure, and those muscles, tense from that throbbing ache that came in waves, relaxed enough for Marty to feel semi-restful in this position. “M’tired,” he yawned, and was met with a chuckled exhale that somewhat approached normalcy.

“Then sleep, kid. You’ve been through a lot, and it might help flush the rest of the cannabis out of your system. You always did tire out easily.” 

“Cannabis…? The only thing I had to eat all night was-” another thick, heavy yawn, and a subconscious  movement had Marty’s arm drape over the one currently supplying him comfort, effectively trapping it in a loose embrace, much like how a small child would hug a stuffed animal. “-was this brownie Needles gave me. There couldn’t be weed in my system.”

“Martin, people can put weed in brownies.” 

Oh. Well, that would certainly explain a few things. But Marty wasn’t exactly in the mental or physical state to dwell on the unintentional mistakes of his very recent past. He didn’t know if it was the ebbing marijuana, or the sheer strength of these painkillers, or the fact that he felt a bit like a waterbed with a hole in the mattress, but he was tired. So, so tired. And he wanted his caretaker to stay, to not pull his arm away or make his wonderfully familiar and security-inducing voice go away. So, Marty gave his arm a brief, but tight squeeze, brought his legs up to curl up as much as he could without it hurting more, and nudged his head against the hand that was petting his hair not a moment ago. “Don’go away,” Marty requested, volume already dissipating as he began to fade out of consciousness once again. 

When the other man spoke now, Marty could hear the smile on his face: “wouldn’t dream of it.”

“You promise?”

“Cross my heart.”

That last sentiment triggered a little giggle from Marty. It wasn’t like his usual giggles, it was that squeaky, tickled kind of giggle one only ever had when their brain was too fogged up with morphine to realize they were giggling. “Tha’s such a weird saying. You always say the funniest things, Dad… ‘Great Scott!’ Who the hell is Scott?” 

And with that, he was out like a light.

Doc didn’t move his arm from this awkward new position he found it in, because he wouldn’t dream of it. Marty was that drugged-up kind of happy and somewhat comfortable and seemed to find a great deal of subconscious comfort by having a part of him to hold onto, quite literally. That was the most important thing to him: that Marty was okay, safe, and felt as much, and if some mild discomfort and pins and needles were all it took to give him that as he snoozed away, Doc was more than happy to provide. Besides, it gave him some time and silence to reflect on Marty’s verbal associations with him.

_ Dad _ ? The first time he said it, Doc assumed he was looking for George McFly: a natural enough impulse for a kid to call out for in a time of need, but the second time confirmed that he was talking about  _ him _ . Did Marty really see him as a father figure? Or, more accurately, just a father? It was a bit overwhelming to think about; considering everything Doc was working towards, everything he was trying to do to give Marty the upbringing and home he deserved, that ironclad validation had one Emmett Brown choking back the lump in his throat and grinning through the mist in his eyes. “Dad,” he whispered to himself, testing that title out. “That’s my boy.”

Marty gave a little fuss in his sleep, no doubt from the pain that must still linger over the painkillers that made up half his bloodstream. There came that strike of paternal worry again, something that only Marty was ever able to trigger in him. Doc shifted his hand just enough to cup Marty’s slack face, running a gentle thumb down his cheek as he soothed him with a quiet shush. Those eyes didn’t open, and his distressed expression relaxed once again. He looked so at peace like this: an odd contrast to everything he was going through physically, mentally, and emotionally. 

The McFlys would be here any minute now, and Doc dreaded to be functionally alone in a room with them while this was occurring. Especially considering that Einstein was the one who sniffed Marty out after running off on him in the middle of the night. How would that sound to them? His menacingly intelligent sheepdog sensed his old dogsitter was in trouble and rushed to his aid? How would this, right now, look to them? Their biological son clinging onto Doc’s arm like a safety blanket? They weren’t on good terms with each other, especially not with all that legal bullshit and impending trial coming up between them over the very boy here. Doc was willing to bite back his pride for Marty’s sake and keep it civil, but he didn’t trust them to do the same thing.

Maybe Dave and Linda would come along too, and they’d have some voice of reason to diffuse their parents’ anger. Doc had never met them, but he’d heard stories from Marty about how they were always treated better than he was, how George and Lorraine seemed to be more forgiving with them. Doc couldn’t imagine how that added layer of emotional manipulation affected Marty in all this.

But no matter what happened, no matter how this evening played out, no matter what he would have to face in the very near future, he wouldn’t have done anything differently, due to the simple fact that Marty was safe, as comfortable as he could be, and on the road to recovery. That was all that mattered.

The slamming of a door behind him made Doc flinch as he was yanked out of his racing train of thought. However, he checked to make sure Marty wasn’t disturbed out of slumber by the sudden loud noise and involuntary movement of his makeshift comfort object before he addressed who he suspected was the source.   
“ _ Brown _ ! You have a lot of nerve, you know that?” Sigh. Now that was a pot calling the kettle black for the history books.

Still, there wasn’t any point in avoiding it, especially if he could take the brunt of the impact and spare Marty from it later. Kid had enough to deal with, and Doc would do anything to take some of his pain away, and it looked as though that very opportunity was presenting itself here. Doc tore his line of sight away from Marty, if only to look up from his chair and meet the eyes of a woman he had come to, put it simply, loathe. 

Behind her, Doc caught a glimpse of the rest of Marty’s family: he recognized George, and he guessed that the 20-something and the young woman were Dave and Linda. George looked sheepish and nervous as ever, and Marty’s older siblings had the good grace to look worried to tears over their brother as they rushed to his bedside with pale, horrified complexions. Okay, he could work with this. It wasn’t the most ideal set up, but then again, nothing involving Lorraine would be. “Hello, Lorraine. Am  _ I _ really who you should be focusing on right now?”


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Have you ever had a nightmare so vivid that you thought it was real?  
> Or, can you really call anything a nightmare when that's just your reality?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *drops in after a month of inactivity* AYOOO 
> 
> Again, I'm so, SO sorry for how long this took, but I'm keeping my promise. This IS getting finished, no matter how long it takes me. Honestly, I don't have much of an excuse this time, other than pandemic depression. Honestly, though? Yeah. I don't know why I expected myself to have the same motivation and drive that I did pre-COVID. There's a pandemic, I'm gonna cut myself some slack here, and y'all should do that for yourselves too, in case anyone needed to hear that. There's a pandemic, folks reading about us in the history books a hundred years from now aren't gonna judge us on not being the most punctual on our Back to the Future fanfiction, y'know? Just wear your mask and take care of yourself and others, and you will be looked upon favorably. But it will get done. It will. I promise. Because I really love writing this story, and I wanna finish it. 
> 
> Thanks to everyone who gives me the motivation to write with your nice reviews and lovely comments. I love y'all. Sorry for how much shit hits the fan in this one.

The human brain is a devilishly complicated and sophisticated machine, but like any computer or car engine, a wrench in the gears can cause a system malfunction. For some nonliving object, this usually spells decreased performance and, in some cases, destruction. But people are not objects, they are organic animals with more nuanced circuitry that is constantly evolving, changing, and fixing itself to fit its environment. This is why consciousness alteration is so easy, and why it’s so sought after. Usually, it’s for recreational purposes, but sometimes, you’re a teenage boy whose cranial software is attempting to make heads or tails of this strange substance being pumped into your power lines in the interest of your hardware.

Whoever said a system reboot was easy? Hit a button and wait for it to sort itself out, right? Unless it’s in the middle of your REM cycle, in which case those confusing lines of code you can only vaguely understand scroll across the surface of your retinas, leaving you with more questions than answers.

Of course, all of this is just your humble author’s uniquely pretentious way of pointing out a morphine-induced nightmare. Well, if one could call it a nightmare. Marty wasn’t sure what to make of it, for it wasn’t exactly good, but it wasn’t exactly bad, either. But it sure was vivid, lucidly hallucinogenic,  _ interesting _ .

He was falling, falling, falling. Endlessly falling isn’t an uncommon nightmare, but something about this was different. The air resistance was all off, his messy hair didn’t whip around in the induced wind, and when Marty looked down to his shoes, suspended in space, his colour perception was different. It was like a blue filter had been slotted into his corneas, effecting his visual input accordingly. It wasn’t a cold blue, but a more inviting, warm one. 

Wait a minute, he wasn’t  _ falling _ , he was  _ floating _ ! Marty pushed himself forward, only to end up flipping himself over in this odd form of sentient suspended animation. With a nervous gulp, he stared down at the bottomless pit of black that stretched below him as far as he could see. Almost on cue, whatever invisible force had been holding him up let go, and Marty yelped in fear as he braced for a long, terrifying fall. 

_ Smash! _

W-what…? Marty blinked open confused blue eyes, and scrambled up into a sitting position. Oh, blue… He should’ve guessed his dreamscape’s logic would follow some nonsense conclusion like that. He gave his head a little shake to jangle his thoughts back into place. Okay, McFly, get a grip on yourself. It’s all a dream. Just a really… intense… 

Glass?!

Marty shot back up onto his feet, spotting the lines of shattered glass that plotted where he had fallen. Other colours were leaking out of them, now: darker blues, almost neon greens, a deep lavender that seemed to follow him wherever he stepped. He gave an experimental little hop, tensing up as the sound of cracking glass leaked back up from underfoot. However, when Marty opened one eye to venture a peek, those brilliant colours grew stronger. The more he broke, the more colourful his dark little world grew. 

So, he ran with it. Quite literally. The thing about lucid dreams is that one has at least some amount of control over their events. Marty felt oddly at peace with this strangely familiar sense of instability this world offered him. It was broken, and only broke more as he jumped along this endless glass pathway and watched in awe as the incandescence around him grew and grew and grew the more he stomped his feet, hopped about, and laughed in glee. He felt like a little boy again, tromping about in the California rain, splashing mud and rainwater all over himself without a care in the world. 

_ Drip, drip, drip. _   
Oh. Rain. He liked the rain, especially when it was heavy. It smelled so nice, it cleaned all the dust and pollen away, it gave the flowers a chance to grow. Marty spread his arms out into that refreshing drizzle that showered him now, sticking his tongue out to catch a few drops. How he loved the rain, and all the new growth it brought in its wake.

The colours began to dull, shifting from blues and purples and greens to more intense reds, oranges, alarming yellows. What happened in the rain? Something happened in the rain…

Marty gave a sudden, pained yowl as a sharp explosion of agony tore into his abdomen, blowing him back with an arm clenched around his side. But when he snuck a quick, panicked look at the damage, nothing was there. No blood, no wound, no… what was that in his eyes? 

The blue filter had shifted to red now, but more thickly, and only then did Marty realize where that blue was coming from: his eyes must have been watering. So why was it red now? A deep, flushed crimson that only grew more opaque by the second. Until Marty blinked, and it broke through to a thick fluid that charted trails of its own down his cheeks. He sniffled, started wiping at his face with the back of his hand, but it only came back smeared with more red. Marty tried again, and again, and again, until he was collapsing to his knees and clawing at his face with hooked fingernails, but that thick, red fluid would not let up from its assault on his tear ducts. 

Marty drew in a shaky, tense inhale. He was on the edge of panic, his hands falling to the cracked glass that was supporting his weight. Oh, god, what was happening? Scarlet droplets, with the help of gravity, trailed down the bridge of his nose, pooling at the tip and dripping down to the spot between where his hands were splayed underneath him.

_ Drip, drip, drip. _

Breathe. Breathe.  _ Breathe. _ Marty closed his eyes, focusing on that silent command. Breathe. It was a dream, it was all a dream. He could control it, he had the power here, if only he could harness it. The dripping stopped, his near-hyperventilation calmed to a steady, slow pattern. There you go, McFly, you have the power. Everything here must bend to your will alone. It is your own subconscious, after all.

Marty wiped the remaining residue off of his face, and stood up on wobbly legs.

_ Crash! _

If you’ve ever made a terrible error in your practical calculations, then you can probably empathize with Marty. With the way the world seems to stop for a moment that lasts its own stretch of eternity as your sophisticated human brain blurs your perception of time in an attempt to process your options as swiftly as possible. For you, perhaps your bicycle’s front tire was suddenly jammed and the momentum launched you clean over your handlebars, or your hand twitched on its grip with your coffee cup, and all you could do was widen your eyes and brace for the worst as that scalding hot water flew unchallenged towards your new white shirt. For Marty, this time dilation seemed to stretch for hours and seconds at a time as the glass that had held him up before now shattered underfoot, leaving nothing but shards and a clear drop into nothing. The wind resistance picked up, his stomach climbed up into his throat, and he could only widen his eyes, open his mouth to scream for all the good that would do, and brace for the worst.

_ Snatch! _

Marty’s blood-curdling scream died into an unexpected halt. Not just of his voice, but a total, full-body halt. He simply stopped falling, very shortly after he started. What the hell…?

“I gotcha! You really oughta be more careful next time, Marty.” A lighthearted tone, mixed with a small helping of gentle scolding that never had any real mirth behind it. Marty knew that voice, he would know it anywhere. His shaky head whipped around to the source of the sound, and never in his life had he been more relieved to be right about something.

“ _ Doc _ ?!” Doc! Doc was always so much stronger than he looked, so much stronger than his age would imply. Solid, reliable, and currently holding Marty up with remarkable stability. Marty felt safer here, with his back leant against one arm and his legs hooked over another, than he did on that glass platform, because Doc wouldn’t drop him. Doc would never drop him.

“Are you alright, Marty? You look a little spooked.” It wasn’t real, Marty knew that. He knew that none of this was real, that this was all in his head, that this wasn’t the real Doc, but sometimes it was nice to pretend, just for a little while.

So, Marty gave his head a little shake, because it wasn’t okay. He wasn’t alright, and a fake version of Doc was the safest person to admit that to. With a slight turn towards Doc, Marty opened his own arms and simply caught him in a tight hug. He knew Doc couldn’t, wouldn’t let go of him, but that was okay. Marty didn’t so much need a returned embrace as he needed something safe to cling onto, and nothing was safer than Doc, save perhaps Jennifer. He burrowed his head down into Doc’s shoulder and let his eyes close, squeezing tight and focusing on that stable, strong hold that was keeping him up. Yeah, yeah… this was good, now. This was okay. If only he could stay like this forever, if only he could drag something resembling this into the real world, maybe he would be okay.

“What’s gotten into you, kid?” Came a bit of a chuckled response, but nonetheless, Doc only shifted to make him more comfortable.

Marty drew in a deep, calm breath. Calm? Yeah, calm. Calm was a strange feeling to have, for it didn’t come often to this teenage boy who had too much to juggle and not enough hands to catch it all. “Nothing, just… don’t drop me.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it.” And he meant what he said.

“But would  _ you _ ?” 

Marty’s blood ran cold. Blue eyes tinted with bloody residue shot open in fear. That wasn’t Doc. That wasn’t Doc’s voice. Equally familiar, but chillingly so, always leaving disaster and fear in her wake. His grip tightened, but not out of that relief and genuine desire to get closer that had overcome him before; now it was a fear of what may happen if he lost his grip. “Mom, please-” his voice cracked, a squeak of fear sounding from him when one of Lorraine’s arms dropped out from under his back.

“What’s the matter, Marty? It’s all a dream anyway.” Lorraine reasoned, as though she were simply stating a well-known fact to a neutral party. “You won’t  _ really _ be hurt.”

“But I’ll still  _ feel _ it!” Marty sobbed back, shaking his head in disbelieving defiance as Lorraine’s other arm dropped out from his legs, leaving only his incredible grip strength, hardened from adrenaline and years of hanging onto the backs of cars to get around to keep him up. His legs dangled in empty air, white-hot terror seizing his muscles as he felt himself begin to slip. “Jesus Christ, Mom,  _ please _ ! It’s not that hard to keep me up, why do you have to do this to me? What did I do to  _ you _ ?!”

Lorraine didn’t glorify him with an answer. She never did, and Marty supposed it was dumb of him to expect a change of character just because it was in his own dreamscape. Even here, she held all the power, didn’t she? Even in his deepest subconscious, he had to bow to her whims, and it would never be the other way around.

Although, sometimes silence speaks more than any amount of words ever could. 

***

A hitched breath and a jerking movement from his own hold, and Marty was back in the waking world, for better or for worse. However, the vividness of certain dreams makes for a rough wake up if it’s not entirely natural. In his case, whatever he had been holding had been removed rather quickly for his liking, leaving the absent space in his arms a bit jarring to something in his psyche. Marty winced and tried to grab for it again, but there was that fresh, burning pain again, making him curl in on himself.

“Marty?!” Came a familiar voice. Not Doc, not Mom, nor Dad, but Dave. Oh, Dave. What did Marty have to say about his older brother? Not much else passed the typical sibling dynamic, really. “Hey, hey, you okay, pal?” 

A light smacking sound, and Linda’s hissed “clearly  _ not _ , dumbass!” followed. It was her hand that reached out, brushed the drenched fringe out of Marty’s cold, sweaty face. He didn’t like it when  _ she _ did it. He gave a little whine and shook his head, trying to nudge her away with as little movement as possible.

But those weren’t the only voices in the room. No, far from it. The others were more muffled, and Marty struggled to concentrate enough to hear them. But as he began to wake up more, it seemed that the lingering marijuana had flushed itself from his system entirely, leaving only the standard drowsiness of hospital painkillers in its wake. The strength was returning to his limbs, his motor skills recalibrating, and with some effort, he managed to roll onto his back and sit up against that shallow, scratchy pillow for a better view. 

His older siblings kept trying to dote over him, but Marty wasn’t paying attention to them, just nudging them away with a carefully whispered “I’m okay, can you guys just shut  _ up _ for a second?” Marty rubbed the sleep out of his eyes with the heel of his hand, his vision adjusting back to his surroundings. He remembered enough of the last time he was conscious to know where he was, why he was here, and that he was going to be okay. He didn’t remember the details, but the general idea was enough to keep any possible panic or uneasiness at bay.

When Marty gestured for silence by pressing his pointer finger to his lips, and followed by looking and pointing in the direction of their parents and Doc, Dave and Linda finally seemed to get the message. Dave opened his mouth to protest at first, but decided against it and simply went to go sit down. Linda, on the other hand, narrowed her eyes towards the trio and listened intently with Marty, nosy as ever.

“ _ Negligence _ ?! It’s  _ our _ fault that he lied to us, now? It’s  _ our  _ fault that that lie caused all  _ this _ ?!”

“You know damn well what I mean, Lorraine. It’s a pattern of behavior, not just one incident. It was because of what you so  _ lovingly _ call your ‘parenting style’ that Marty was tangled up and stuck in this mess in the first place.” Doc never raised his voice, not to Marty, at least. Even now, he was calm, albeit chillingly so. A stark contrast to his mother’s angered snarling and borderline yelling. “You think he would’ve ran off on his own if he felt at  _ all _ safe calling you or George to come get him? A child’s actions don’t exist in a fucking vacuum, and you’d do well to learn that.”

Lorraine guffawed, as if that was the most ridiculous argument she’d ever heard in her life. She responded in kind: “child?! He’s almost seventeen years old! He’s the only one who’s ever had to make trouble in this family, and I’ll have you know that both Dave and Linda turned out just fine.” That comment got Dave perking his head up and turning his sights on them. Even Dave, huh? The man so uninterested in gossip that he actively avoided it; even he was looking a bit uncomfortable with where this spat was clearly heading.

“Marty is  _ not _ Dave or Linda! He’s his own person, and you need to treat him like it. Children are not molds to be shaped as their parents see fit, they’re  _ people _ , and teenagers are still children, as difficult as that may be for you to grasp. A transitional stage of life does not give you the right to swing the pendulum between both sides as it becomes convenient for your current argument.” Marty put his head down now, keeping his ears trained on Doc, but he couldn’t watch it anymore. Not after all those brutally honest comments. Well, Mom was moreso the brutal side of that. Doc? Doc wasn’t very brutal. Doc was firm and tough when he needed to be, like now, but he was never brutal. Otherwise, he was kind, welcoming, tried to see the good in everything he did and everywhere he went and everyone he met. He wasn’t naive, not in the slightest. Doc had simply decided that he’d rather remain soft and kind than allow the cold, harsh, cruel world out there change that fundamental part of who he was. 

“And you know Marty  _ so _ well, do you?” Oh, there it was: the brutality. That harsh, raised tone that made Marty tense. But she’d never hit him before, never gotten physical, so why such a visceral reaction every time he heard her like this? Marty shoved that thought away as soon as it came up, for there was no use in spiralling down that rabbit hole again. That was what got him here, after all. “You, the failed inventor, who uses him like some kind of lab rat? Is that why he’s here? One of your so-called ‘experiments’ blow up on you again? I wouldn’t be surprised if it was  _ you _ who got him into this mess,  _ you _ who gave him the drugs for some kind of sick, twisted experiment, your  _ negligence _ that got him stabbed, your-”   
“Why  _ do _ you care about him so much, anyway?”

Now that voice commanded attention. Not because it was demanding, or that it dominated a room, because it certainly didn’t. It simply never spoke up, never made itself known, so when George McFly did have the courage to speak in any way that wasn’t the epitome of cowardly, the whole world listened. Marty’s head snapped back to those three, locked in their argument. Dave furrowed his brow and widened his eyes. Linda crossed her arms and leaned forward to listen more intently. Even Doc was taken aback by this. Shy, innocent, scared little George McFly, speaking up? It had to be a dream. But it wasn’t, because Marty had just woken up from one.

“No, seriously, no one else finds that relationship weird?” George crossed his arms, looking Doc in the eye as he tilted his head to the side with narrowed eyes. “The reclusive, unmarried, old, town eccentric taking so much interest in a teenage boy? One that you yourself just implied was impressionable and in need of guidance?” 

Doc stammered out something incomprehensible, and shuffled uncomfortably on the spot. Of course he did, because that implied accusation was so horrific, so unthinkable, so  _ untrue _ , that it left it nigh impossible to come up with a suitable retort. The time in which one was expected to respond was simply filled by their own gobsmacked shock. 

That was all the hesitation George needed. All the hesitation a once-aspiring science fiction writer would need to hone that wordsmithing craft of his. In a rare show of assertiveness, George stepped forward, and Doc stepped back, his expressive face putting said shock on full display. “How many years do you have on Marty, again? 50? I think it’s closer to 60, yes? And what, you expect me to  _ believe _ that ‘lab assistant’ bullshit after the stunt you pulled with that custody lawyer? After the stunt you pulled  _ tonight _ ?!”   
Custody lawyer? Marty knitted his eyebrows together. This was the first time he was hearing about this. He  _ must _ have misheard. He had to. Yeah, no way Dad had said what Marty thought he had. No need to add more confusion to his growing hoard.

But that proverbial suitcase could be unpacked later. Right now, George was backing Doc into a makeshift corner with every further step, herding him right towards the door. “What lab assistant regularly spends the night at his part-time job? What lab assistant works for someone who can’t get a single successful invention off the ground? What kind of man in his-what, 60s? 70s? How old  _ are _ you?!-hangs out with a teenage boy he’s not related to, doesn’t work with, and has no general cause for being around in the first place? It’s  _ weird _ , Emmett. So forgive us if we expect some kind of, I don’t know,  _ ulterior motive _ , I’ll just say.”

Doc was practically herded out the door now, standing in the frame as he bore the brunt of this anger and chaos. However, that calm facade came crashing down when George emphasized that last phrase. Marty had never seen Doc angry before, had never seen what his wrath looked like. But the way his voice hardened, the way that fire lit up behind his eyes and the way his lip curled back in a snarl made him grateful that he wasn’t on the receiving end of it. “How  _ dare _ you.” Doc didn’t yell, he still didn’t yell. “How fucking  _ dare _ you insinuate I would do  _ anything _ of that nature to Marty. To anyone. How dare you stand there and grasp at straws for some fleeting way to defame  _ my _ character just because you know damn  _ fucking  _ well that you have no real, solid case against me other than whatever rumors and gossip you can drudge up against me. You think I care what a couple of neglectful, emotionally abusive, gaslighting connoisseurs think of me? You think I care what  _ anyone _ in this town thinks of me? Then you haven’t really been paying attention, have you?” Marty had to look away again, for he couldn’t bear the sight of Doc’s anger much longer. Even Dave and Linda were tensing up and looking away, looking very much like they wished to drown those continuous bombshells out.

“You wanna talk about pedophilia?” Marty didn’t have to see it to know that George flinched at how bluntly Doc said that. “What, you can’t handle hearing the term for your own accusation? Maybe you shouldn’t go around accusing people of things you can’t even bear to hear, then,  _ Mr. McFly. _ ” The formal title wasn’t genuine. The ironic sarcasm could be clocked from 50 paces. “If you really cared about that, if you really were concerned about Marty’s potential exposure to something like that, you would not be standing here and solely using it against  _ me _ , who you claim to be the abuser. Why waste all this time and energy on some scumbag like me when your fucking  _ son _ needs help working through that kind of trauma?”

When there was no response other than a heavy, deafening silence, Doc scoffed distastefully at them, as though their actions had made them unworthy of the air from his lungs. With a threatening, imposing poke to George’s chest that sent him back by another step, he hammered it all home. “Don’t liberally throw around such weighty accusations if you can’t handle the heat you’re jumping into, you hear me? This is exactly  _ why _ Marty will have his day in court, and I’ll see you there, too. You people make me sick.”

Doc only calmed down when a nurse came up from behind him with a poke to his shoulder, an unimpressed look on her face. “Sir, visiting hours for the general public are over. An emergency contact doesn’t make you immediate family, so I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”

No, no, no. Marty whipped his head around fast enough to make himself dizzy, giving Doc a pleading look. A silent beg to stay, to fight it, to do… something! 

But Doc couldn’t fight that, no. He couldn’t fight a whole institution. The best he could do was give a heavy sigh, a nod to that nurse, and one last look to Marty, ignoring the glared daggers from George and Lorraine.  _ Don’t leave me alone _ , Marty mouthed, a frightened little shake of his head indicating his fear at the very idea. 

_ I’m sorry, kid. _ Doc mouthed back. There was no added ‘I love you’ like he clearly wanted to say. Not after what Marty’s parents had just accused him of. They had taken that little caring affirmation away from him, too. They had literally taken any verbal confirmation of love away from him, because tarnishing it with disgusting indictments was more convenient for them.  _ It’s gonna be okay _ . Well, at least he had that.

Doc didn’t let his head hang low, for he wouldn’t give his parents that feeling of power. His eyes did drop though as he turned around and left, biting at his bottom lip as if to conceal some powerful emotion from being seen.   
Marty knew he had no choice. Marty knew Doc would never leave him alone like this unless he absolutely had to. Marty knew that Doc was still holding him up in a secure hold much stronger than any other 71 year-old could muster up, but he couldn’t help the immediate feeling that he was just dropped.   



End file.
